THE QUESTION is often asked,
and properly so, in regard to any supposed moral standard — What is its
sanction? what are the motives to obey it? or more specifically, what is the
source of its obligation? whence does it derive its binding force? It is a
necessary part of moral philosophy to provide the answer to this question;
which, though frequently assuming the shape of an objection to the utilitarian
morality, as if it had some special applicability to that above others, really
arises in regard to all standards. It arises, in fact, whenever a person is
called on to adopt a standard, or refer morality to any basis on which he has
not been accustomed to rest it. For the customary morality, that which
education and opinion have consecrated, is the only one which presents itself
to the mind with the feeling of being in itself obligatory; and when a person
is asked to believe that this morality derives its obligation from some general
principle round which custom has not thrown the same halo, the assertion is to
him a paradox; the supposed corollaries seem to have a more binding force than
the original theorem; the superstructure seems to stand better without, than
with, what is represented as its foundation. He says to himself, I feel that I
am bound not to rob or murder, betray or deceive; but why am I bound to promote
the general happiness? If my own happiness lies in something else, why may I
not give that the preference?

If the view adopted by the utilitarian philosophy of the nature of the moral
sense be correct, this difficulty will always present itself, until the
influences which form moral character have taken the same hold of the principle
which they have taken of some of the consequences — until, by the
improvement of education, the feeling of unity with our fellow-creatures shall
be (what it cannot be denied that Christ intended it to be) as deeply rooted in
our character, and to our own consciousness as completely a part of our nature,
as the horror of crime is in an ordinarily well brought up young person. In the
meantime, however, the difficulty has no peculiar application to the doctrine
of utility, but is inherent in every attempt to analyse morality and reduce it
to principles; which, unless the principle is already in men's minds invested
with as much sacredness as any of its applications, always seems to divest them
of a part of their sanctity.

The principle of utility either has, or there is no reason why it might not
have, all the sanctions which belong to any other system of morals. Those
sanctions are either external or internal. Of the external sanctions it is not
necessary to speak at any length. They are, the hope of favour and the fear of
displeasure, from our fellow creatures or from the Ruler of the Universe, along
with whatever we may have of sympathy or affection for them, or of love and awe
of Him, inclining us to do his will independently of selfish consequences.
There is evidently no reason why all these motives for observance should not
attach themselves to the utilitarian morality, as completely and as powerfully
as to any other. Indeed, those of them which refer to our fellow creatures are
sure to do so, in proportion to the amount of general intelligence; for whether
there be any other ground of moral obligation than the general happiness or
not, men do desire happiness; and however imperfect may be their own practice,
they desire and commend all conduct in others towards themselves, by which they
think their happiness is promoted. With regard to the religious motive, if men
believe, as most profess to do, in the goodness of God, those who think that
conduciveness to the general happiness is the essence, or even only the
criterion of good, must necessarily believe that it is also that which God
approves. The whole force therefore of external reward and punishment, whether
physical or moral, and whether proceeding from God or from our fellow men,
together with all that the capacities of human nature admit of disinterested
devotion to either, become available to enforce the utilitarian morality, in
proportion as that morality is recognised; and the more powerfully, the more
the appliances of education and general cultivation are bent to the purpose.

So far as to external sanctions. The internal sanction of duty, whatever our
standard of duty may be, is one and the same — a feeling in our own mind;
a pain, more or less intense, attendant on violation of duty, which in properly
cultivated moral natures rises, in the more serious cases, into shrinking from
it as an impossibility. This feeling, when disinterested, and connecting itself
with the pure idea of duty, and not with some particular form of it, or with
any of the merely accessory circumstances, is the essence of Conscience; though
in that complex phenomenon as it actually exists, the simple fact is in general
all encrusted over with collateral associations, derived from sympathy, from
love, and still more from fear; from all the forms of religious feeling; from
the recollections of childhood and of all our past life; from self-esteem,
desire of the esteem of others, and occasionally even self-abasement. This
extreme complication is, I apprehend, the origin of the sort of mystical
character which, by a tendency of the human mind of which there are many other
examples, is apt to be attributed to the idea of moral obligation, and which
leads people to believe that the idea cannot possibly attach itself to any
other objects than those which, by a supposed mysterious law, are found in our
present experience to excite it. Its binding force, however, consists in the
existence of a mass of feeling which must be broken through in order to do what
violates our standard of right, and which, if we do nevertheless violate that
standard, will probably have to be encountered afterwards in the form of
remorse. Whatever theory we have of the nature or origin of conscience, this is
what essentially constitutes it.

The ultimate sanction, therefore, of all morality (external motives apart)
being a subjective feeling in our own minds, I see nothing embarrassing to
those whose standard is utility, in the question, what is the sanction of that
particular standard? We may answer, the same as of all other moral standards
— the conscientious feelings of mankind. Undoubtedly this sanction has no
binding efficacy on those who do not possess the feelings it appeals to; but
neither will these persons be more obedient to any other moral principle than
to the utilitarian one. On them morality of any kind has no hold but through
the external sanctions. Meanwhile the feelings exist, a fact in human nature,
the reality of which, and the great power with which they are capable of acting
on those in whom they have been duly cultivated, are proved by experience. No
reason has ever been shown why they may not be cultivated to as great intensity
in connection with the utilitarian, as with any other rule of morals.

There is, I am aware, a disposition to believe that a person who sees in
moral obligation a transcendental fact, an objective reality belonging to the
province of "Things in themselves," is likely to be more obedient to
it than one who believes it to be entirely subjective, having its seat in human
consciousness only. But whatever a person's opinion may be on this point of
Ontology, the force he is really urged by is his own subjective feeling, and is
exactly measured by its strength. No one's belief that duty is an objective
reality is stronger than the belief that God is so; yet the belief in God,
apart from the expectation of actual reward and punishment, only operates on
conduct through, and in proportion to, the subjective religious feeling. The
sanction, so far as it is disinterested, is always in the mind itself; and the
notion therefore of the transcendental moralists must be, that this sanction
will not exist in the mind unless it is believed to have its root out of the
mind; and that if a person is able to say to himself, This which is restraining
me, and which is called my conscience, is only a feeling in my own mind, he may
possibly draw the conclusion that when the feeling ceases the obligation
ceases, and that if he find the feeling inconvenient, he may disregard it, and
endeavour to get rid of it. But is this danger confined to the utilitarian
morality? Does the belief that moral obligation has its seat outside the mind
make the feeling of it too strong to be got rid of? The fact is so far
otherwise, that all moralists admit and lament the ease with which, in the
generality of minds, conscience can be silenced or stifled. The question, Need
I obey my conscience? is quite as often put to themselves by persons who never
heard of the principle of utility, as by its adherents. Those whose
conscientious feelings are so weak as to allow of their asking this question,
if they answer it affirmatively, will not do so because they believe in the
transcendental theory, but because of the external sanctions.

It is not necessary, for the present purpose, to decide whether the feeling
of duty is innate or implanted. Assuming it to be innate, it is an open
question to what objects it naturally attaches itself; for the philosophic
supporters of that theory are now agreed that the intuitive perception is of
principles of morality and not of the details. If there be anything innate in
the matter, I see no reason why the feeling which is innate should not be that
of regard to the pleasures and pains of others. If there is any principle of
morals which is intuitively obligatory, I should say it must be that. If so,
the intuitive ethics would coincide with the utilitarian, and there would be no
further quarrel between them. Even as it is, the intuitive moralists, though
they believe that there are other intuitive moral obligations, do already
believe this to one; for they unanimously hold that a large portion of morality
turns upon the consideration due to the interests of our fellow-creatures.
Therefore, if the belief in the transcendental origin of moral obligation gives
any additional efficacy to the internal sanction, it appears to me that the
utilitarian principle has already the benefit of it.

On the other hand, if, as is my own belief, the moral feelings are not
innate, but acquired, they are not for that reason the less natural. It is
natural to man to speak, to reason, to build cities, to cultivate the ground,
though these are acquired faculties. The moral feelings are not indeed a part
of our nature, in the sense of being in any perceptible degree present in all
of us; but this, unhappily, is a fact admitted by those who believe the most
strenuously in their transcendental origin. Like the other acquired capacities
above referred to, the moral faculty, if not a part of our nature, is a natural
outgrowth from it; capable, like them, in a certain small degree, of springing
up spontaneously; and susceptible of being brought by cultivation to a high
degree of development. Unhappily it is also susceptible, by a sufficient use of
the external sanctions and of the force of early impressions, of being
cultivated in almost any direction: so that there is hardly anything so absurd
or so mischievous that it may not, by means of these influences, be made to act
on the human mind with all the authority of conscience. To doubt that the same
potency might be given by the same means to the principle of utility, even if
it had no foundation in human nature, would be flying in the face of all
experience.

But moral associations which are wholly of artificial creation, when
intellectual culture goes on, yield by degrees to the dissolving force of
analysis: and if the feeling of duty, when associated with utility, would
appear equally arbitrary; if there were no leading department of our nature, no
powerful class of sentiments, with which that association would harmonise,
which would make us feel it congenial, and incline us not only to foster it in
others (for which we have abundant interested motives), but also to cherish it
in ourselves; if there were not, in short, a natural basis of sentiment for
utilitarian morality, it might well happen that this association also, even
after it had been implanted by education, might be analysed away. But there is
this basis of powerful natural sentiment; and this it is which, when once the
general happiness is recognised as the ethical standard, will constitute the
strength of the utilitarian morality. This firm foundation is that of the
social feelings of mankind; the desire to be in unity with our fellow
creatures, which is already a powerful principle in human nature, and happily
one of those which tend to become stronger, even without express inculcation,
from the influences of advancing civilisation. The social state is at once so
natural, so necessary, and so habitual to man, that, except in some unusual
circumstances or by an effort of voluntary abstraction, he never conceives
himself otherwise than as a member of a body; and this association is riveted
more and more, as mankind are further removed from the state of savage
independence. Any condition, therefore, which is essential to a state of
society, becomes more and more an inseparable part of every person's conception
of the state of things which he is born into, and which is the destiny of a
human being.

Now, society between human beings, except in the relation of master and
slave, is manifestly impossible on any other footing than that the interests of
all are to be consulted. Society between equals can only exist on the
understanding that the interests of all are to be regarded equally. And since
in all states of civilisation, every person, except an absolute monarch, has
equals, every one is obliged to live on these terms with somebody; and in every
age some advance is made towards a state in which it will be impossible to live
permanently on other terms with anybody. In this way people grow up unable to
conceive as possible to them a state of total disregard of other people's
interests. They are under a necessity of conceiving themselves as at least
abstaining from all the grosser injuries, and (if only for their own
protection) living in a state of constant protest against them. They are also
familiar with the fact of co-operating with others and proposing to themselves
a collective, not an individual interest as the aim (at least for the time
being) of their actions. So long as they are co-operating, their ends are
identified with those of others; there is at least a temporary feeling that the
interests of others are their own interests. Not only does all strengthening of
social ties, and all healthy growth of society, give to each individual a
stronger personal interest in practically consulting the welfare of others; it
also leads him to identify his feelings more and more with their good, or at
least with an even greater degree of practical consideration for it. He comes,
as though instinctively, to be conscious of himself as a being who of course
pays regard to others. The good of others becomes to him a thing naturally and
necessarily to be attended to, like any of the physical conditions of our
existence. Now, whatever amount of this feeling a person has, he is urged by
the strongest motives both of interest and of sympathy to demonstrate it, and
to the utmost of his power encourage it in others; and even if he has none of
it himself, he is as greatly interested as any one else that others should have
it. Consequently the smallest germs of the feeling are laid hold of and
nourished by the contagion of sympathy and the influences of education; and a
complete web of corroborative association is woven round it, by the powerful
agency of the external sanctions.

This mode of conceiving ourselves and human life, as civilisation goes on,
is felt to be more and more natural. Every step in political improvement
renders it more so, by removing the sources of opposition of interest, and
levelling those inequalities of legal privilege between individuals or classes,
owing to which there are large portions of mankind whose happiness it is still
practicable to disregard. In an improving state of the human mind, the
influences are constantly on the increase, which tend to generate in each
individual a feeling of unity with all the rest; which, if perfect, would make
him never think of, or desire, any beneficial condition for himself, in the
benefits of which they are not included. If we now suppose this feeling of
unity to be taught as a religion, and the whole force of education, of
institutions, and of opinion, directed, as it once was in the case of religion,
to make every person grow up from infancy surrounded on all sides both by the
profession and the practice of it, I think that no one, who can realise this
conception, will feel any misgiving about the sufficiency of the ultimate
sanction for the Happiness morality. To any ethical student who finds the
realisation difficult, I recommend, as a means of facilitating it, the second
of M. Comte's two principle works, the Traite de Politique Positive. I
entertain the strongest objections to the system of politics and morals set
forth in that treatise; but I think it has superabundantly shown the
possibility of giving to the service of humanity, even without the aid of
belief in a Providence, both the psychological power and the social efficacy of
a religion; making it take hold of human life, and colour all thought, feeling,
and action, in a manner of which the greatest ascendancy ever exercised by any
religion may be but a type and foretaste; and of which the danger is, not that
it should be insufficient but that it should be so excessive as to interfere
unduly with human freedom and individuality.

Neither is it necessary to the feeling which constitutes the binding force
of the utilitarian morality on those who recognise it, to wait for those social
influences which would make its obligation felt by mankind at large. In the
comparatively early state of human advancement in which we now live, a person
cannot indeed feel that entireness of sympathy with all others, which would
make any real discordance in the general direction of their conduct in life
impossible; but already a person in whom the social feeling is at all
developed, cannot bring himself to think of the rest of his fellow creatures as
struggling rivals with him for the means of happiness, whom he must desire to
see defeated in their object in order that he may succeed in his. The deeply
rooted conception which every individual even now has of himself as a social
being, tends to make him feel it one of his natural wants that there should be
harmony between his feelings and aims and those of his fellow creatures. If
differences of opinion and of mental culture make it impossible for him to
share many of their actual feelings — perhaps make him denounce and defy
those feelings — he still needs to be conscious that his real aim and
theirs do not conflict; that he is not opposing himself to what they really
wish for, namely their own good, but is, on the contrary, promoting it. This
feeling in most individuals is much inferior in strength to their selfish
feelings, and is often wanting altogether. But to those who have it, it
possesses all the characters of a natural feeling. It does not present itself
to their minds as a superstition of education, or a law despotically imposed by
the power of society, but as an attribute which it would not be well for them
to be without. This conviction is the ultimate sanction of the greatest
happiness morality. This it is which makes any mind, of well-developed
feelings, work with, and not against, the outward motives to care for others,
afforded by what I have called the external sanctions; and when those sanctions
are wanting, or act in an opposite direction, constitutes in itself a powerful
internal binding force, in proportion to the sensitiveness and thoughtfulness
of the character; since few but those whose mind is a moral blank, could bear
to lay out their course of life on the plan of paying no regard to others
except so far as their own private interest compels.